Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari has asked the main Shia coalition to confirm his candidacy in a bid to break the deadlock over a new government. Mr Jaafari's candidacy is rejected by Sunni Arabs, Kurds and others and some members of his own coalition. Until now he has refused repeated demands to stand down. Parliament was due to meet for its second session on Thursday, but it was postponed to allow the United Iraqi Alliance to consider Mr Jaafari's fate. BBC correspondent Jim Muir says the hope is that the UIA will pick a new nominee acceptable to all parties, so that the government formation can go ahead swiftly - or it could renominate Mr Jaafari. ... http://news.bbc.co.uk

Americans are leaving the nation's big cities in search of cheaper homes and open spaces farther out. Nearly every large metropolitan area had more people move out than move in from 2000 to 2004, with a few exceptions in the South and Southwest, according to a report being released Thursday by the Census Bureau. Northeasterners are moving South and West. West Coast residents are moving inland. Midwesterners are chasing better job markets. And just about everywhere, people are escaping to the outer suburbs, also known as exurbs. "It's a case of middle class flight, a flight for housing affordability," said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. "But it's not just white middle class flight, it's Hispanics and blacks, too." The Census Bureau measured domestic migration people moving within the United States from 1990 to 2000, and from 2000 to 2004. The report provides the number of people moving into and out of each state and ...http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-04-20-urbanflight_x.htm

A Mexican priest has confessed to strangling a woman with whom he had an 18-month-old child, before chopping up and dumping her body, authorities say. Cesar Torres, 42, admitted killing his lover, 22-year-old Veronica Andrade Salinas, on Easter Sunday, a state attorney general said. A row between the two erupted shortly after Torres had said Mass. Police arrested Torres after being tipped off by the victim's mother, and finding him covered in bruises. The mother said the pair had been in a relationship for years, since they first met when Ms Salinas was 13. They had a daughter 18 months ago. Ms Salinas apparently called on Torres after Mass at the Sacred Heart of Jesus church in Nezahualcoyotl, on the eastern outskirts of Mexico City, said the attorney general of Mexico state, Abel Villicana. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4926364.stm

Nepalese security forces have opened fire on protesters in the capital, Kathmandu, killing at least three people, hospital sources say. At least 100,000 people defied a shoot-on-sight curfew, marching on central Kathmandu to rally against the absolute rule of King Gyanendra. Doctors say at least 40 others were injured, some seriously. The king imposed direct rule in February 2005, saying the government had failed to defeat Nepal's Maoists. Thursday's deaths were the first in the capital during two weeks of national strikes and protests by an alliance of seven opposition parties. Ten people have been killed elsewhere since the strike began. The UN human rights body, the UNHCR, on Thursday accused the government of obstructing the deployment of its monitors in the Kathmandu Valley in "clear violation" of an agreement...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4924610.stm

Suspected militants opened fire Thursday on vehicles carrying Pakistani security forces in a northwestern tribal region near the Afghan border, killing seven soldiers and wounding 22, an army spokesman said. The attack took place on the outskirts of Miran Shah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region, spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan said. The wounded were transported to a hospital. A security official, who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to media, said at least three were in critical condition. Sultan said the attackers had fled to a nearby village and security forces were responding to the attack. He gave no further details, but a second security official in the region, who requested anonymity for the same reason, said the army, backed by helicopter gunships, was hunting for the militants. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1864111&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312

The Pentagon has released its most extensive list of foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, providing the names and nationalities of 558 detainees who went through a hearing process there. The U.S. Defense Department posted the 11-page list on its Web site late on Wednesday in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the Associated Press.The largest number of detainees on the list came from Saudi Arabia, with 132, followed by Afghanistan with 125 and Yemen with 107. The prisoners came from 40 countries and the West Bank.Only 10 of the detainees at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have been charged and not one of the trials has been completed. Most of the detainees were captured in Afghanistan and the Pentagon accused many of complicity with al Qaeda or the Taliban....http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060420/pl_nm/security_guantanamo_dc